Controversial opinions

[Daren]

I'd say they care to some degree, or they wouldn't have let Ash become a regional Champion in the succeeding saga, with less effort on his part, to make up for Kalos.

It's difficult to say without official confirmation (which I am skeptical will ever come, at least while the show is running) if the Kalos backlash is why he was allowed to win in Alola.
There are three other possibilities (other than sheer randomness) I can think of; they wanted to follow the games by having a Kanto character become the first Alola champion, they had run out of spots and didn't want him to fall back or stall out again, or it actually was the writers and not the executives all along and the change after XY shifted the vote (or however it was decided) in Ash's favor.
Likely there are other possible reasons that slipped my mind at the moment.

And honestly if they do care about fan reaction I wouldn't say it's a point in favor of Cynthia winning.
Ash winning in Alola got a ton of positive attention for the anime--even Forbes reported on it. It's easy to imagine this leading to them deciding it brings the show good press if they let Ash win in each series, and JN has been trying to go viral and does things clearly intended to get the internet buzz going (Dragonite started trending after he caught one, and his JN party in general has a lot of crowd pleaser species').

Besides all that, I'm sure that they didn't expect the huge backlash from Ash losing to Alain.

This may be true, I admit that I struggle sometimes at factoring in that a lot of people (especially older ones) aren't as plugged into the internet.
For someone watching the internet there was clearly a ton of hype for Ash to win a league with a very popular team that included his first final form psuedo and almost everyone fully evolved, but if you don't follow social media that can be easy to miss.

 

[Alola]

Ehhhhh.....I would not call his Sinnoh 'mons movesets diverse and potent. Not all of them, anyway. You seem to forget that Buizel forgot Water Pulse but kept Water Gun, a weaker move in every way, and after dropping Water Pulse Ice Punch and maaaybe Aqua Jet are the only moves of Buizel's I would consider good. And let us not forget poor Torterra, burdened with one of the worst movesets I think I've ever seen on a Torterra....ever. Three Grass type moves, only one of which was really good, (Synthesis was....okay I guess,) no coverage to speak of whatsoever, and a useless, crippling move in Rock Climb that never did it any favors after evolving into Torterra. The other's movesets, to be fair, were better. (Gliscor and Infernape's were the best of all.) But Gible was mostly a gag mon and one could argue Infernape stole the show away from everybody else anyway.

Which is why I said collectively. But let's look at the movesets with a ranking O for good, - for adequate, and X for bad/redundant. This is also considering applications and the versatility of the moves.

Pikachu: Thunderbolt/Quick Attack/Iron Tail/ Volt Tackle (O)
Staraptor: Aerial Ace/Quick Attack/Close Combat/Brave Bird (O)
Torterra: Energy Ball/Leaf Storm/Rock Climb/Synthesis (-)
Infernape: Mach Punch/Flare Blitz/Flamethrower/Dig (O)
Buizel: Water Gun/Aqua Jet/Ice Punch/Sonic Boom (-)
Gliscor: Fire Fang/Stone Edge/X-Scissor/Giga Impact (-)
(Special Mention) Gible: Dig/Dragon Pulse/Draco Meteor/Rock Smash (O)

As you can see, there is a diverse collection of full movesets among all six/seven of Ash's Pokémon; no one repeats STAB moves more than twice either and coverage-wise, they utilize 13 of the (at the time) 17 types. I don't know how you would argue this as not diverse; regarding potency, we have strong moves in Thunderbolt, Flamethrower, X-Scissor, Brave Bird, Close Combat, Dig, Ice Punch, Energy Ball, Iron Tail, Leaf Storm, Draco Meteor, etc. I am failing to see your argument aside from disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing.

You're right about Buizel forgetting Water Pulse in lieu of Ice Punch; for all intents and purposes, Pulse is stronger than Water Gun. But if we look at the application of the move, there is merit - Ice Punch, Aqua Jet, and Sonic Boom require the use of Buizel's body or its appendages, as did Water Pulse; Water Gun does not, as we saw to great effect when Buizel battled Drapion, was immobilized by it, but was still able to get off Water Gun via its mouth. Furthermore, Water Gun was used for a Counter Shield (!) while Water Pulse could not. These are factors into the diversity of versality of moves that the anime brings. For Torterra, I agree they could have given it coverage; Energy Ball felt redundant with Leaf Storm, but given the work Ash put into it it makes sense it wasn't forgotten; Ground-type moves, aside from Dig, were out of the question due to the earthquake tragedies in Japan. But even if you consider Torterra's offensive shortcomings, it still was the only one with the ability to self-heal which is unique among Ash's Pokémon, specifically his Grass-types. And again, if you look at the party collectively, they brought much to the battlefield with their moves as a unit.

There is still time for Dracovish and Sirfetch'd's movesets to improve, you realize. I have a hunch that's going to happen sooner than you might think. And I did say Ash was very inconsistently written in this series, didn't I? Inconsistency usually isn't a good thing. Clearly, there's a lot of stuff going on in the fabled off-screen land in this series, and I'm not a fan of it.

There is time, but they may not; just look at Snivy, Pignite, and Oshawott. And you don't get to use inconsistency as an excuse for arguing that Ash is apparently the strongest he's ever been - everything written and animated is fair game for analysis and comparison. There are some people who feel Ash has been inconsistent ever since he arrived in Hoenn due to losing the snark that made up his character in the OS series, so that's not flying with me.

If I had to guess, the move Dragonite forgot for Draco Meteor (and yes, that was most likely a genuine Draco Meteor, the way it was first used was a little unorthodox, to be sure, but I'm almost positive it was the real deal,) was Hyper Beam. Given that the only two times it was used it failed, I would say thay would be the one to go. Which would mean that Dragonite's current moveset is Dragon Dance, Dragon Claw, Hurricane, and Draco Meteor. Not too shabby, if you ask me.

It leaves Dragonite walled by Steel-types, which goes against the coverage that you're championing though. Which it still would be even with Hyper Beam... Anyway, time will tell what its final moveset will end up being. And yes, you're right about the awesome of Dragon Dance and Dragon Claw.

The first two moves alone make it a force to reckoned with. And you keep talking about all this training Ash did with his Pokemon in DP, and I get it, it was good. However, what about all the training he did with Torterra when it was a Grotle to improve its defense? That seemed to get shelved prettty quickly when Infernape came a-knockin'.

Because on-screen training leads to battle development and good characterization for Trainer(s) and Pokémon involved, which is a major criticism of Journeys as it lacks that. Of course I'm going to refer to that when someone like yourself makes the claim that Ash is currently the most powerful he has ever been as Trainer, when we have nothing to show from it aside from obligatory plot advancements no different from previous sagas. And I don't understand the point you're trying to make with Grotle. The reason Grotle got more focus as a Grotle than as a Torterra was because the two evolutions have a similar weight-dynamic unlike Turtwig; there wasn't a need to revisit it when Grotle/Torterra had already come to terms with its new battle style. Which, by the way, Ash used successfully in his seventh Gym Battle, being the reason Grotle defeated the advantageous Sneasel as well as being the climax of said training paid off. There was also the fact that while Ash had made progress with Grotle's shortcoming by that point, he had not yet with Monferno's/Infernape's Blaze, which got carried all the way to the climax of the 8th Gym; so yes, that needed focus for the story they wanted to tell. Lastly, the focus on Infernape does not negate the focus and training everyone else received prior and after - which, again, is more than Journeys.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I'm tired of seeing a well-written Ash who we get to see train and improve over the course of the series just come up short in the end. Even though this series has had abysmal writing overall, and I'm not even going to try to pretend that it was good, if Ash can win here, with actual serious stakes and a well-written, serious battle, I'm all for it.

And that's fine. But I don't think the answer to that is to champion an Ash with lackluster development and writing as a Trainer over better depicted instances of his Trainer career, personally.

 

[BlueEyesBlackDragon]

The kiss that was entirely offscreen? The kiss that was mainly one-sided? I've seen plenty of kids media where one kid gets kissed. This show ain't special.

Are you talking about japanese or american cartoons? because from what i’ve gathered kissing is a taboo in kodomomuke. Not a lot of shows have their main characters (10 year olds) share a kiss be it offscreen or onscreen.

 

[Unireon]

Satoshi winning against either Shirona and Dande is something that I don't want to see/happen.
It would be very contrived due to Journeys' nature of just telling without showing.

The development is far more important than the conclussion/outcome.
Why should I root for a team composed of flat fighting automatons?

They don't even deserve to knock a single Pokemon of those Champions.

Calling the reserves would have been an option; but I think that they, like Goukazaru, would be wasted anyway.

 

[Sai]

Of course Ash is going to beat Cynthia, they set up Ash vs Leon as the final fight of the series. They're not constantly having all these Ash/Leon eps for them not to battle. This isn't like a regular league where Ash isn't set up to fight the final person. Absolutely strange some of you can't see this telegraphed since the series started.

 

[HiroHunter]

Ash's JN team is his worst pokemon team. Even worse then his Johto and Unova teams because at least with them they had good character moments going for them the JN team doesn't even have that.

 

[Die-Hard Dragon Devotee]

As you can see, there is a diverse collection of full movesets among all six/seven of Ash's Pokémon; no one repeats STAB moves more than twice either and coverage-wise, they utilize 13 of the (at the time) 17 types. I don't know how you would argue this as not diverse; regarding potency, we have strong moves in Thunderbolt, Flamethrower, X-Scissor, Brave Bird, Close Combat, Dig, Ice Punch, Energy Ball, Iron Tail, Leaf Storm, Draco Meteor, etc. I am failing to see your argument aside from disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing.

Look, I'm just going to drop it right here. I'm not a fan of arguments, and it doesn't look this is going anywhere anyway. I wasn't the biggest fan of Dawn or the DP series at times, so maybe that has something to do with it. (But I'll stand by the opinion that Torterra was done dirty in moveset and wins, Gible and Buizel should have evolved, and the ending of the Sinnoh League was BS, just like the ending of the Kalos League. And there's still time/hope for Ash's Journeys team, it's not too late for a turnaround.) Let's just agree to disagree and leave it at that.

Ash's JN team is his worst pokemon team. Even worse then his Johto and Unova teams because at least with them they had good character moments going for them the JN team doesn't even have that.

In character development and personality for the Pokemon, yes, it is easily the worst team, bar none. But you can thank the incompetence of the writers for that.

 

[Hidden Mew]

Of course Ash is going to beat Cynthia, they set up Ash vs Leon as the final fight of the series. They're not constantly having all these Ash/Leon eps for them not to battle. This isn't like a regular league where Ash isn't set up to fight the final person. Absolutely strange some of you can't see this telegraphed since the series started.

I don't think anyone is saying that they won't battle. I'm just saying I'm not convinced of Ash beating powerful trainers like Leon or Cynthia. They've made it clear that Ash vs. Leon will happen in some format, but I just don't think he'll win at the moment.

 

[Die-Hard Dragon Devotee]

I don't think anyone is saying that they won't battle. I'm just saying I'm not convinced of Ash beating powerful trainers like Leon or Cynthia. They've made it clear that Ash vs. Leon will happen in some format, but I just don't think he'll win at the moment.

I have confidence Ash will beat both of them.

 

[R1ke]

I think he will beat Cynthia, even if his team doesn't look that impressive rn. They've given them sudden powerups or moveset overhauls offscreen so they might do that again to 'close the gap', so to speak

Also feel like his victory against Leon (the 'strongest' in the world) would be undermined if he lost to someone else prior to him

 

[HiroHunter]

I think he will beat Cynthia, even if his team doesn't look that impressive rn. They've given them sudden powerups or moveset overhauls offscreen so they might do that again to 'close the gap', so to speak

Also feel like his victory against Leon (the 'strongest' in the world) would be undermined if he lost to someone else prior to him

Just handing them offscreen and unearned powerups will already undermined the win with Cynthia let alone with Leon.

 

[Die-Hard Dragon Devotee]

Just handing them offscreen and unearned powerups will already undermined the win with Cynthia let alone with Leon.

Oh, well. It's the best we can hope for from this series at this point.

 

[R1ke]

Just handing them offscreen and unearned powerups will already undermined the win with Cynthia let alone with Leon.

I mean yeah but I wouldn't put it past them to do that

 

[HiroHunter]

Oh, well. It's the best we can hope for from this series at this point.

If this is the best we can hope for then i'm glad I dropped this when I did.

 

[Die-Hard Dragon Devotee]

If this is the best we can hope for then i'm glad I dropped this when I did.

Eh, stick around to the end. You might just be pleasantly suprised. Like Ash used to say, "Don't give up 'till it's over!"

 

[HiroHunter]

Eh, stick around to the end. You might just be pleasantly suprised. Like Ash used to say, "Don't give up 'till it's over!"

Just looking back at the past 2 nearly 3 years of this. The chances of the end of this mess making any of this worth it is next to zero.

 

[Die-Hard Dragon Devotee]

Just looking back at the past 2 nearly 3 years of this. The chances of the end of this mess making any of this worth it is next to zero.

Hmmmm......maybe they can pull a SM and have a strong finish.

 

[HiroHunter]

Hmmmm......maybe they can pull a SM and have a strong finish.

The thing is with SM it had good moments overall, it had some good characters and it gave you reason to care about both the human characters and the pokemon. JN has done none of these things so having a "strong finish" isn't going to make the years of bad leading up to point worth it or better.

 

[Die-Hard Dragon Devotee]

The thing is with SM it had good moments overall, it had some good characters and it gave you reason to care about both the human characters and the pokemon. JN has done none of these things so having a "strong finish" isn't going to make the years of bad leading up to point worth it or better.

Yeahhh.....you're not wrong there. I guess it'll take a minor miracle to save Journeys at this point, huh?

 

[Alola]

Look, I'm just going to drop it right here. I'm not a fan of arguments, and it doesn't look this is going anywhere anyway. I wasn't the biggest fan of Dawn or the DP series at times, so maybe that has something to do with it. (But I'll stand by the opinion that Torterra was done dirty in moveset and wins, Gible and Buizel should have evolved, and the ending of the Sinnoh League was BS, just like the ending of the Kalos League.

Admittedly, it is getting a bit confusing as you shift the focus on your argument; first it was Journeys Ash & his team being the strongest in the series so far, then his DP team not having diverse and powerful moves when they did, and now it is an expression of dissatisfaction with elements of DP along with a contextual revelation to not even liking the saga.

And there's still time/hope for Ash's Journeys team, it's not too late for a turnaround.) Let's just agree to disagree and leave it at that.

I can't refute this, especially given how I have echoed the same statement for Journeys getting better as a whole. While I may not think Ash is on Cynthia or Leon level at the moment, given what we have seen (and not seen) so far, I do think there is time for the show to illustrate a better chance with what remaining time it has left.